Psychosomatic Medicine 26:224-249 (1964)
© 1964 American Psychosomatic Society

Studies on the Experimental Evocation of Depressive Responses using Hypnosis

III. The Secretory Rate of Total Gastric Acid with Respect to Various Spontaneous Experiences such as Nausea, Disgust, Crying, and Dyspnea

¹ University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Department of Psychiatry and Medicine, Rochester, N. Y.; University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry, Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, Pittsburgh, Pa.
² University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Department of Psychiatry and Medicine, Rochester, N. Y.; University of Otago School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry, Dunedin, New Zealand

Seven healthy volunteers were the subjects of 78 experiments during which psychological and physiological data were collected and recorded in a standardized manner. Each experiment consisted of five equal periods (phases) of 30 min., during three of which the subjects were hypnotized. The subjects' continuous reporting provided the means of identifying a variety of phenomenological experiences. Transcripts of the subjects' recorded speech were used operationally to define the following categories of experience: nausea, disgust, vertigo, dizziness, dyspnea, crying, thirst, hunger, olfactory hallucinations, the hallucinatory ingestion of food, the hallucinatory sight of food, and the idea of food. The group results revealed a consistent association between the direction of the secretory rate of total gastric acid and the coincident phenomenological experience irrespective of whether or not the subjects were hypnotized.

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